Excellent point. I have a hard time understanding why all civil servants don't have the typical 401K retirement plans that the rest of us have? e.g. 50% match up to 6% of salary and the rest is up to the individual.....

When I worked for the Government in 1991-1996m I had a MSEE with honors, and got hired in at a GS-12. What interesting, is that admins, and business majors with BA degrees were getting hired in and promoted to GS-13 and up. Now what I found crazy is that I worked > 60 hours per week on Navy hardware, and all the humanities folks pushed paper. When I realized that all these admins were dragging their feet on purpose, it was clear that the Government unfortunately has a waste factor combined with allowed laziness, rarely timecards.

After 5 years I was filled with guilt not of my R&D and hardware, but of the unspeakable waste all around me. I quit, the goverment jobs were broken. This was 1996. Now I still see people from my local school admins starting off as a manager at $130K with a MA in Education. When I was in college, these were the ones partying far more than the engineers, but perhaps I was just jealous?

When I worked for the Government in 1991-1996m I had a MSEE with honors, and got hired in at a GS-12. What interesting, is that admins, and business majors with BA degrees were getting hired in and promoted to GS-13 and up. Now what I found crazy is that I worked > 60 hours per week on Navy hardware, and all the humanities folks pushed paper. When I realized that all these admins were dragging their feet on purpose, it was clear that the Government unfortunately has a waste factor combined with allowed laziness, rarely timecards.

After 5 years I was filled with guilt not of my R&D and hardware, but of the unspeakable waste all around me. I quit, the goverment jobs were broken. This was 1996. Now I still see people from my local school admins starting off as a manager at $130K with a MA in Education. When I was in college, these were the ones partying far more than the engineers, but perhaps I was just jealous?

After years of competitive, difficult education, years of bone grinding perpetual long hours and work that would make the average person insane or shell shocked for the rest of their lives, physicians should be chained like galley slaves to their work with only bread and water. After all , they have the privilege of saving my precious ass, that should be reward enough.

Of course, if they make a mistake, they should be flayed alive at the stake then burned.

After years of competitive, difficult education, years of bone grinding perpetual long hours and work that would make the average person insane or shell shocked for the rest of their lives, physicians should be chained like galley slaves to their work with only bread and water. After all , they have the privilege of saving my precious ass, that should be reward enough.

Of course, if they make a mistake, they should be flayed alive at the stake then burned.

You have to differentiate - there are highly skilled surgeons saving peoples lives every day and there are a lot of MDs doing standard tests they learned 20 years ago in med school, reading from equally outdated charts and peddle drugs pushed by big pharma that do more harm than good, such as putting kids on statins and other crap. What's worse, they often fail to recognize and handle complex chronic conditions that cannot be treated with one magic pill but require an ongoing patient-doctor relationship with recurrent testing and tweaking of the patients metabolism, minerals, vitamins, hormonal and immune system, AKA functional medicine. This is in its infancy at best and for that price patients should expect better.

Now when you ask me if that doctor is overpaid who woke up at 3 am on Sunday, to come repair some drunks eyeball, then no, I would say he wasn't paid enough.

This is a very sad story, and I have sympathy for you. But: there are endless anecdotes where someone thinks that whatever a doctor was paid was not enough, because it saved their life, their child, (fill in the details).

Sorry to have to state the obvious, but there is NO way to assert whether these doctors were overpaid or not without having heard what the bill was, and how much of it was taken by the hospital.

Doctor's get paid handsomely for being on call, often sleeping at the hospital for the express purpose of being awaken as needed.

By the way, when you see figures such as $200k / year, keep in mind that this is after ALL possible expenses have been subtracted, deducted and maximized to the very fullest extent of the law. And it is an average that includes the very lowest cost-of-living areas of the whole country.

We had another one of these threads just a short while ago. More data there.

I don't think we should point to doctor's salaries. I think we should point to CEO and executive salaries as busting at the seams.

It depends on the care. For a 15 minute visit after a 30 minute wait and some basic measurements everybody could do at home, followed by a quick read of the standard charts and some pharma recommended drug of choice they are way to high. Sadly this is prevalent these days. No doubt your surgeon deserved his money, as much as a functional doc who knows your social circumstances, keeps a binder with your health history and all the tests ordered (incl. medical history from visits to other MDs), tries to explore lifestyle choices and supplements before pushing drugs and keeps up with latest research instead of regurgitating common and possibly outdated med school "wisdom" from 20 year ago, takes up to 60 minutes for the consultations and makes you not wait more than 15 minutes by not cramming in as many patients as possible.

Unsustainable public employee wages and benefits are bankrupting USA. in USA EVERYBODY in medical field is paid way too high compared to the rest of developed countries. USA spends 17% of GDP for healthcare vs 8% rest of developed countries where everybody is covered from cradle to grave for 100% of medical needs.

Unsustainable public employee wages and benefits are bankrupting USA. in USA EVERYBODY in medical field is paid way too high compared to the rest of developed countries. USA spends 17% of GDP for healthcare vs 8% rest of developed countries where everybody is covered from cradle to grave for 100% of medical needs.

Medical field employees aren't public employee's in the US. They are public employees in every other developed country where as you point out the cost of health care is half. So what's your point?

This question, although intended as rhetorical (note the absence of a question mark), goes to the heart of the problem: the Rx mandate. If the solution to your problem requires an Rx, no amount of knowledge will spare you from paying the licensed gatekeepers their mandatory toll, whatever it might be. Your very life might be at stake, from an infection that you could treat for $20 in Mexico, but here in "the land of the free" you are legally required to pay and pay again.

The AMA represents fewer than 20% of doctors, so Meccos hold off before again falsely accusing me of hating doctors, but consider this. If you're dying of thirst and there is a potable water fountain within your reach, but some self-appointed expert keeps you from it "for your own good" until you pay him ransom, is he overpaid? In answering that question, does the exact amount of payment even matter?

Perhaps ironically, this problem even affects doctors. You could have decades of experience and even a license in another jurisdiction, it won't matter, you'll still need to buy permission from a twerp half your age who is paid to sell you something more expensive. Government mandates (Obamacare, Rx) are inherently about maximizing spending, which means revenue to the lobbyists who wrote the legislation.

If the solution to your problem requires an Rx, no amount of knowledge will spare you from paying the licensed gatekeepers their mandatory toll, whatever it might be.

Got to love someone that can't make a consistent position. I though people were so lacking in knowledge about drugs they were being screwed time and time again by buying expensive on patent drugs instead of cheap generics. Which is it? Are people experts on diagnosing their conditions and prescription needs or clueless rubes being fleeced time and again?

Plus you are being just plain old un American. If people didn't need prescriptions they wouldn't have anyone to sue when they fucked it up. That's just totally against everything you believe in and America stands for. There has to be someone else to blame for everything.

Oh Bob, back to your opiate-addled memory again, I don't know whose biography you have me mixed up with now but it ain't me, Bob. There is no inconsistency between saying (a) people have an inalienable right to liberty and (b) they shouldn't be required to pay drug salesmen with MDs to mislead them. But, since you get a cut of the $ from the Rx mandate, perhaps you can't see that.

Provided you didn't die after receiving fake drugs, not uncommon for drugs to just be placebo's in Mexico.

Toxo Bob, if you are going to try to call other people stupid, you could at least learn when to use an apostrophe and when not to. If you can't do that, you might try being nicer, so you don't seem like such an obnoxious fool. I begin to think T. Gondii has driven your whole biography, from the sideways sliding Mustang at 50% over the speed limit to surfing with sharks to the endless efforts to pick fights all over the World Wide Web to the fact that a doctor found you sufficiently attractive to marry; without her your bio might have ended years ago in a Jersey shore bar fight.

The proven incidence in the USA of expired, fake, and/or improperly stored drugs, and pharmacists misreading the illegible handwriting on the Rx, and pharmacists decanting the wrong pill into the bottle with no way for the customer to check the original label, add up to much worse than alleged placebos in Mexico. In fact, Homefool would be lucky to get a placebo rather than the toxic "not habit forming" SSRIs his licensed pushers keep him hooked on, except he'd have to go through withdrawal syndrome. AMA and FDA try to scare people away from Mexico, but Americans with a choice have been crossing the border for a long time and keep doing so.

The proven incidence in the USA of expired, fake, and/or improperly stored drugs, and pharmacists misreading the illegible handwriting on the Rx, and pharmacists decanting the wrong pill into the bottle with no way for the customer to check the original label, add up to much worse than alleged placebos in Mexico.

Your proof of this is what exactly? You are saying Mexico doesn't have " expired, fake, and/or improperly stored drugs, and pharmacists misreading the illegible handwriting on the Rx, and pharmacists decanting the wrong pill into the bottle with no way for the customer to check the original label," in addition to lots of outright fraud and corruption with non existent oversight. I lived 10 minutes from Matamoros and spent a lot of time in Mexico. I like Mexico, but it's very third world dysfunctional. You are about 1000 times more likely to be ripped off in Mexico than the US with anything you buy. I can't imagine why you view it was a shining example of the way things should be.

Oh Bob, back to your opiate-addled memory again, I don't know whose biography you have me mixed up with now but it ain't me, Bob. There is no inconsistency between saying (a) people have an inalienable right to liberty and (b) they shouldn't be required to pay drug salesmen with MDs to mislead them. But, since you get a cut of the $ from the Rx mandate, perhaps you can't see that.

As usual you just resort to being insulting when you can't answer a question. My 9 year old does the same thing. I believe he will grow out of it as he matures. For you I hold no such hope.

So what's the missing answer to the question? Are people clueless rubes or sophisticated users? They can't be both, despite your arguing both sides. I could go through your postings and point out where you have ranted and raved about people not being smart enough to get generics or using totally useless drugs after being duped time by the pharma industry. Seems like in your mind Homeboy is just such an example as you pointed out right above. So these people that are so clueless should have an inalienable liberty to buy and use whatever drugs they fancy? That should work out pretty well.

An inalienable right to liberty? Is this a joke? I've never suspected you of having a sense of humour. My personal experience is that people who scream the loudest about freedom and liberty are the first to expect someone else to pay when it doesn't work out. They aren't aware of and/or choose to ignore the word responsibility which is the other side of liberty. I would have no problem with people having an inalienable right to buy whatever drug they wanted if they took total responsibility when they fucked up. Let me know when this state of utopia will happen.

My memory may be opiate addled after taking oxycontin for 2 days 10 years ago when I had my shattered hand surgically put back together (no on else on the planet but you would come to that conclusion, congratulations you are an N of 1), but you are the one that somehow managed to forget you took the MCATs. If I was a young man like you with that big a memory problem I would be very concerned. I can give you the names of some doctors I know in Matamoros if you would like.

An inalienable right to liberty? Is this a joke?...My personal experience is that people who....

Actually it was a reference to the Declaration of Independence, but I wouldn't expect your memory to recognize that. As for your personal experience and the generalizations you've drawn from other people, if your comments here are any indication I doubt you can even recall who's who anyway, but the people who can stand you are hardly a representative sample of the population generally.

So what's the missing answer to the question? Are people clueless rubes or sophisticated users?

These seem to be more of your sarcastic rhetorical questions, which are neither charming nor persuasive, but I'll answer. An advantage to respecting other people's inalienable right to liberty is you don't have to play god or put yourself in loco parentis. Your wife doesn't need to stand guard at Home Depot and prohibit anyone from buying a drill until she's thoroughly examined them and determined (in her infinite licensed wisdom, and at their mandatory expense) that this is the right drill for them. If customers have a question, they can ask, and if the drill malfunctions due to internal defects, they can even sue the manufacturer, but if they drop the drill on their toes or if they accidentally drill through their own thumbs then they can become customers for your medical practice which you'll surely look forward to the revenue from. That is how most of the economy has always worked, but you don't understand it because your $$$ that you boast about (fancy houses in Texas, sports cars and shattered hands, etc.) depends on keeping people dependent on the mandatory permission slips that your wife sells. The short answer to your sarcastic rhetorical question about the clueless and the sophisticated is, there have always been some of each, from the founding of the republic through the present day, but it is only recently that certain lobbyists have discovered the vast fortunes that can be extracted by using government mandates to trap people in a state of frightened dependence.

LOL you're back to that false claim again. Can you please provide a link to where I ever even mentioned the MCAT? Last time you quoted Rin, without a link, and misattributed his comment to me. As for your memory, maybe you had a pre-existing condition or maybe you've been sedated without your knowledge by someone with an Rx pad in order to keep your misdirected aggression under control. Bob, you're hopeless, find someone who shares your Toxoplasmosis Gondii induced need to brawl and have at it. You can hurl misplaced insults at each other, and accuse each other of saying things neither of you ever said, to your heart's content. Just leave me out of it. I've wasted enough time on you[, so congratulations, you're my first Ignore Updated April 16: sorry about the ignore, I've switched that off now. I was busy and distracted with taxes etc so didn't have time to find any links. Nevertheless, I have wasted enough time on Bob's rhetorical questions and sarcasm. If he has any question why (doubtful), he can check my recent comment where he was wrong about Medicare's place in the budget; I went out of my way to be nice and found an official link correcting his error as gently as possible, and the thanks I get is only more sarcasm and rhetorical questions, no appreciation and not even an admission that he was obviously clearly wrong. Waste of time.].

Come on it's not the Doctors salary that's the problem.
It's the 10 people wearing scrubs, for every patient in the medical system. 10 people who's only function is to do the job, that you're already paying the damn Doctor to do. And to tell you the truth, I'd feel a lot better about our health care system, if it were the Doctors doing their own thermometer shoving, drawing blood, pill dispensing. ect... I bet there would be a lot less lawsuits.
Then there's there's 15 administrators for every 2 people wearing scrubs. Administrators from HR staff of the Hospitals, medical billing, and insurance companies. Who have 0 input on the outcome of the quality of healthcare.

Come on, Doctors are supposed to be decorated in the laurels of their hard work to become Doctors.